MLBPipeline.com though has a fully updated Nats system top 30, including the 2017 draft prospects, and the list is kind of telling. Lets dive into it, looking at some of the new guys, the guys who are off the list, the movers and the fallers.

The Top 4 hasn’t changed: Victor Robles, Juan Soto, Erick Fedde and Carter Kieboom remain our top 4 prospects, as they have been ever since we parted ways with Lucas Giolito and Reynaldo Lopez (more on them later). Now, whether this will still be the case in a week’s time, when the trade deadline has passed, remains to be seen. Robles remains the #1 guy, the guy who I think the team is looking at to have a “passing of the torch” moment once Bryce Harper departs town, and remains an incredible bargain in terms of bonus-dollars-versus-prospect status ($225k bonus in 2014). Soto has streaked up the ranks: prior to the beginning of the 2016 season he wasn’t even in the top 30 lists; now he’s pushing Robles at the top.

Six of our Top 30 are 2017 draftees: This was the point that surprised me, looking at the list. MLB’s #5, 6, 16, 19, 22 and 24th ranked players have played for about a month now in our low minors. #5 and #6 (the ones that are somewhat meaningful) are of course our top two drafted arms Seth Romero and Wil Crowe. The reason there’s so much room for adding new draftees though is…

We’ve lost a TON of prospects in the last 12 months: Just looking at my master list, here’s the departures from prospect lists lately:

Graduated: Grace, Glover, Cole, Goodwin this year, Turner last year

Traded: Neuse, Luzardo this year, Giolito, Lopez, Dunning, Hearn, Schrock, Avila last year or last off-season. Dunning in particular was in our system so shortly that he never made it to a ranking list.

That’s 13 guys, some of whom were pretty prominently ranked and all of whom were mentioned here or there on various lists.

Now, how about the guys that are left? Here’s some guys who are really shooting up, rankings wise (and yes, some of their rise is due to the surgical removal of so many guys above them … nonetheless, these guys have all played well):

Juan Soto: as mentioned above; MLB has him #2 now. A year ago he was in the 15-17 range, and prior to 2016 season he was a nobody, outside the top 30.

Yasel Antuna: our big-money 2016 IFA signing is not disappointing; he had no playing time this time last year and was ranked in the 19-25 range just based on his bonus. Now? He’s hitting .300 as a 17-yr old in the GCL with nearly a .40o OBP (as of this writing).

Daniel Johnson: recently promoted and it was well earned: Johnson hit 17 homers in the first half in Hagerstown (not an easy place to hit for power), made the all-star team, and got promoted. MLB.com has him 10th right now; they had him #29th in April.

Blake Perkins: It looks like he’s finally getting the hang of switch hitting, and his OPS in Low-A is 200 points higher than it was last year. He has generally been in the 16-20 range of prospects; now he’s at #11.

McKenzie Mills: the lefty Low-A starter has exploded this year; he sits at 12-2 with more than a K/inning for Hagerstown, made the All-Star team and seems ready for a promotion. MLB has him at #18 in our system; he’s never even been an honorable mention before.

Raudy Read: he’s stepped it up a bit, hitting for some power and holding his slash line to respectable levels as a 23-yr old in AA (and on the 40-man roster).

Taylor Gushue: also a 23-yr old catcher, with an OPS above .820 one level below Read in High-A. Never before ranked (at least for us), MLB.com has him 25th now. I could see these two catchers pushing each other and pushing the likes of Severino and Lobaton off the 40-man.

And here’s some guys whose prospect value has taken a nosedive this year:

Pedro Severino: speaking of catcher depth; Severino has seen his stats take a nose dive as he repeats AAA; his 1.048 OPS figure for the Nats last September seems like a mirage. He’s still on the 40-man, and his reputation is more about his defense than his offense, but that’s still just a backup catcher ceiling.

Drew Ward: Year after year, Ward’s prospect value drops. He used to be top 10; now he’s fallen to the 20-range. He’s repeating AA and hitting just .224; he’ll be rule-5 eligible this coming off-season but I can’t see saving him with a roster spot right now. If he doesn’t turn it around, he’ll end up in org-guy territory soon.

Austin Voth: perhaps the most curious of our falling prospects. He was in the 6-7 range just a year and a half ago, then finished a full strong season in AAA. 2017? He’s struggled, gotten demoted, and struggled further.

Jakson Reetz: he’s now pushed down to 26th, after routinely hanging out in the 10-15 range after being such a high draft pick. He’s basically been socially promoted by virtue of his bonus figure, having never hit above .230 outside of complex ball. He’s now backing up a guy in Gushue who’s 2 years older, but also has an OPS that’s 200 points better.

Anderson Franco: what happened here? He was solid in rookie ball … and barely at the mendoza line in full season ball. Another guy routinely given top 10 rankings early on; he’s now just hanging on ranked #27 by MLB.

Osvaldo Abreu: he’s moved up a level a year, now playing in AA, but his numbers have had corresponding declines with each promotion. He wasn’t ever considered a major prospect, but now he’s barely considered a minor one.

Telmito Agustin: he couldn’t hack it in High-A and was demoted back to Low-A this year. He’s only 20, so he has time, but he’s basically out of the prospect discussions for now.

Nick Banks & Rhett Wisemann: both big-time college program upper-end draft picks, both scuffling professionally. Neither now ranked by MLB whereas both had cracks at the top 10 of our prospect lists at some point.

Joan Baez: you can’t teach velocity right? Well for Potomac this year Baez had more walks than Ks … and more walks than innings pitched. He’s now a 22-yr old in GCL beating up on a bunch of kids, hoping to get his mojo back.

Matt Skole: he’s still a “prospect” remember? He’s 27, hitting .235 in AAA, and has yet to be called up even though the team is so short on hitters that they called up Severino this past week. I put Skole in here just to see if MartyC is still reading.

And now for some predictions related to our prospects:

Fedde is getting called up and soon, and will exhaust his rookie eligibility before the season is over. The team can’t let Edwin Jackson post 5+ ERAs like he’s been doing for the last few seasons.

Robles, Soto, Kieboom stay put to keep our top 4 in tact at the trade deadline.

I can see the team cashing in some lesser prospects in trade though, perhaps guys ranked in the 8-15 range. Selling high on Daniel Johnson perhaps, or flipping some C depth from Severino, Read, Gushue, Kieboom.

#1 prospect next year: still Robles; he’s not debuting until at least the super-2 deadline next year.

# prospect once Robles graduates: It’ll be Soto. For reasons explained in the next bullet point…

How quickly will Romero get to the Majors? Pretty quickly. I could see him ending next year in AA, then pushing for a spot in the 2019 staff. He won’t be in the minors long enough to get ranked above Soto. That is unless he turns out to continue his knuckle-headedness… at which point we’ll all write many comments about how we “told you so” for drafting him.

Did I miss anyone?

PS: fun trivia; there have only been eleven (11) different players to hold the title as “#1 Washington Nationals prospect” since Nov 2004. I’ll bet you can’t name them all.

‘Notes from the back fields
I saw newly acquired Athletics LHP Jesus Luzardo last night and he was very effective. He sat 90-95, touched 96, and threw his changeup and breaking ball for stikes. His changeup is advanced, as it was when Luzardo was in high school, and a potential plus offering. The curveball, two-planed and slurvy but tight, is average now and potentially above at peak. His body looks to be in better shape than it was when he was an amateur.”

The drafting of Romero and the emergence of McKenzie Mills made Luzardo available. He’s just off TJ and years away.

Romero still hasn’t pitched for the GCL team. This is the guy who was supposed to be in the MLB bullpen by the end of the year? What gives? At this rate, he’ll be doing well to start in Hagerstown next year, so doubtful he ends the year in AA unless he’s lights out.

More thoughts tomorrow. On the MLB.com list, numbers 2 and 4 have barely played this year, #5 hasn’t played at all as a pro, #6 has less than four pro innings, and #s 8 & 9 only have about six weeks of pro ball. (Antuna has looked significantly better than Garcia thus far, keeping in mind that both are the age of high school juniors.)

I suspect Ross Detwiler probably held this at some point, but I don’t know if he ever actually displaced Marrero. I also have a vague recollection that Kory Casto was our top ranked prospect at some point (keep that in mind if you ever worry about the state of the Nats farm system). That would be 10. Who else came from the Expos? Collin Balester? Clint Everts?

NG: You’ve definitely got those 8 right. Marrero is a good pull; that’s one of the harder ones.

No on Dewiler believe it or not. He was #2 on a bunch of lists to Marrero, then when Jordan Zimmermann blew up he supplanted Detwiler on the ranks. However Detwiler was never lower than 4th, never higher than 2nd during the brief time he was on lists.

No on Casto: he was as high as #2 on the early lists … but I started basically when nats announced they were moving here, so he very well may have been #1 prior to Nov 2004.

Yes on Balester; he was #1 on exactly one List, in Jan 2007, when Baseball America listed him over Marrero while every other list in that timeframe had Marrero #1.

We have a far better feel for the Nats prospects than mlb.com and the pundits.

One thing we need to keep in mind is that players do leap forward and players hit the wall. These prospect rankings are slow to reflect those changes.

My take on the Nats system is that the talent pool has significantly depleted, although trades and graduation are minor reasons. The bigger reason is that players are really tailing off from earlier expectations at the top levels. THAT to me is the biggest story of the year, just as Juan Soto’s emergence as a dominating 17 year old set the stage for stocking the GCL Baby Nats with FOUR seventeen year old imports. And they’ve validated that decision.

Hype has a way of sustaining itself. Robles was the top prospect last year, not Giolito, but no one could get past the idea the ‘Keith Law loves him, so he must be great.”

These prospect rankings do not measure intangibles.I was laughed off when I was saying, two years ago from the beginning of his AAA run, that Turner would be a transformative player at the top of the Nats offense and would make the team exciting as it should be, that speed kills.

I don’t know how one can rank players who have not played a game. Ranking these draftees and the internationals already is ridiculous. The issue is forced because of trades, and the level of underperformance in the system. But that’s also just laziness by the writers.

With that noted, a few points:

1) There are players who have a certain “it.” Turner has it. Teams win because of them. They have to produce, yes, but those players rise because they have ‘It.” Wilmer Difo has “it.” He was panned here for not walking enough, but he sure knows how to walk now. And his energy and impact is the reason the Nats have repeatedly given him chances, even with his rookie mistakes. And his defense at SS is more than anyone ever expected. Hurrah for him, the “lower-level prospect.” I think the same of Severino. He is a fiery, alive player who has a future in the majors. I hope we see him more. Of the players who have graduated this year, only Glover was a top three for me (higher than Fedde) and none of the others top-10.

2) Which brings me to point 2. We keep seeing players with miserable stats in Syracuse. What’s up with that? Even Bryce Harper played better after his promotion. So I look at Goodwin and wonder what is happening there that makes players underperform relative to their overall ceiling.

3) The talk about Soto is to me organizational hype to obscure his injury, which is obviously more serious than known. Same with Kieboom.

4) I also think Daniel Johnson is a lot closer in ceiling to Soto than given credit, and may yet pass him. He is short, but his power is real and he plays great defense, steals bases and has an arm. Soto is a refined batsmen very advanced for his age. My point is not one of rankings, but to note that Soto may be expendable (for Iglesias) because of Johnson just as Luzardo was expendable because of the many emerging lefties in the system (hell, look at what Ben Braymer is doing in Auburn (same draft, no TJ), and Neuse was expendable because of Kieboom’s big showing.

5) This is such a buyers market. It looks as though quality players are being moved for lower level prospects. I hope Rizzo buys wisely and lurks until the deadline and then sneaks in, like EBay.

With the above noted, I would see the system as follows. If the 2016 draftees graduate to Hagerstown, we’ll have a good feel for who is a riser. As for the short leagues we need more time to watch, especially given small sample. But Antuna, bad though his defense has been, is making a big impression as are a number of others, so by years end I am sure this list will look different, at least past #10.

Hmm. Joe Ross for Yu Darvish straight up. Yeah i think i’d make that trade. Ross is really for two more years, since he’ll miss most of 2018 without a guarantee that he remains effective or reverts to his 2016 form. Remember, before he was hurt this season he was pretty ineffective.

(You kind of have to focus on the negatives of the player when you’re thinking of moving him, just to make yoruself feel better

Ross is actually controlled for four more seasons (according to BR), so a net of three, assuming 2018 is mostly lost. It’s a tough call to give up that much control. The response, of course, would be control of what? He’s a talented guy (and still only 24), but even at his best, he’s struggled to stay consistently effective, and he’s never stayed healthy.

So yeah, I’d probably do it. I would rather get a guy who is at least here through 2018, though, even though the price would be higher.

The latest rumor has the Nats looking at Rosenthal and Pham from the Cards. I wouldn’t mind adding either of them, for the right price. Rosenthal is controlled for one more year. He’s got extensive postseason experience. Pham is having a breakout year, with 14 HRs and an OPS+ of 140. I’m not sure how he’s that much different from MAT, though.

Wieters: I just read that Fangraphs article. I love it when bloggers say things like, “even though Wieters is owed $10M for next year, the Nats should replace him and eat the money.”

I’m pretty sure its the same guy who said the nats should do the same thing with Zimmerman.

Have you seen the catcher market? If you play fantasy, you know that there’s not even 10 catchers in the league who provide a Positive experience at the plate right now. Posey, Perez, Contreras, Sanchez, Realmuto, Flowers (maybe), … the list drops off quickly. Unless we grow a replacement, there’s little reason to think the team could upgrade from Wieters in trade or in the FA market. Lucroy has dropped off the face of the earth. A couple of the best FAs next off season have ridiculously cheap options. Lobaton is a FA so maybe we’re looking at a season of Severino backing up Wieters while the rest of our catching depth races to see who is next in line. Severino, Solano, Kieboom, Read, Gushue, Barrera, Reetz I guess is the current depth chart?

Yep, I made similar points all offseason when everyone was clamoring for the Nats to upgrade at catcher. With the lack of quality out there, it’s surprising that there isn’t more buzz about the Tigers potentially shopping Avila.

Really, the Tigers have everything the Nats need: Fulmer, Wilson, and Avila.

And no, the Nats do not eat salary. That would be a trivia question about as good as the #1 minor-leaguers: how many times have the Nats eaten more than $1M in salary? The only one that immediately comes to mind is Pap. They maybe be facing eating a little more than a million on Blanton soon, though.

Fulmer, Wilson and Avila would likely cost Robles, Soto and Fedde. While that may be fair value, I don’t know that I’d have the cojones.

I agree with the premise of the Fangraphs article on Weiters. He’s adding neither offense nor defensive value. But they can probably avoid addressing it because their top 4 are so strong, and Trea is coming back in a month.

Re: catching depth. Talked about this before, about 25-26 teams are thin at catching in their system. The Nats are in relatively decent shape.
Severino is a tranformative defensive catcher, the best we’ve seen since Schneider.
Hopefully his hit tool gets better, no one knows if it will.

Side note; I see that Strasburg 10th in fWAR this year. 14th in ERA, 7th in K/9, 11th in SIERA, 7th in FIP. 15th in K/BB despite being 6th in average FB velocity among qualified starters.

Yet there’s still people who don’t think he’s an “Ace.” Why is that? If you expand the scope from just this season to the last 3, or the last 5, he remains top 10 across all of baseball yet again. So if you’re a top 10 starter in the majors by nearly any statistical measure … aren’t you an “Ace?”

I didn’t really mean that the Nats would be able to pull off such a mega-deal with the Tigers . . . although that would be the ultimate go-for-it deal, wouldn’t it? Actually, in addition to all the prospects it would take, I would think the Tigers would also insist that the receiving team take at least one of their bad contracts from among J-Up/Miggy/JZim/Verlander.

And thank goodness the Mets no longer have Fulmer! They traded him for Cespedes, along with one of the two guys the Tigers flipped to get Wilson.

Avila is only signed through ’17, and his salary this year is only $2M, with less than half of that left. He’d definitely be a prime target for me. One senses that the Nats like the catchers they have, though, for some reason.

As bad as the Mets are taking care of players in the major leagues, they have a good scouting and player development organization. They produce some quality players. We’re lucky that they’ve been so inept at the big league level.

What’s the over/under that the Nats make another deal? Can’t be more than 50/50, right?

Right now, everything is a big game of chicken. The sellers are overpricing their talent, and the buyers are waiting for the prices to come down. The very good teams, including the Nats, don’t need much. The Nats, Dodgers, and Astros don’t need anything to win their divisions. But when you’ve got rich teams out there like the Yanks, Bosox, and Cubs who are having to fight tooth and nail, all the sellers see big returns in their future.

The problem for the Nats is that they don’t have much use for the mid-range talent that might be available, and they’re not desperate enough to spend big for the top guys.

I think Rizzo will make at least one more trade, but it may just be for a non-closing bullpen guy. If they have faith in Stras’s health, they don’t need a starter. If they’re worried about it, they need a Gray/Davish-level starter who will cost a lot. I don’t think they’re that worried about the catching for the team that’s already producing the second-most runs in baseball. Taylor, Werth, and Turner will be back at some point, as should Kelley and Glover, although neither has been much to write home about.

If Rizzo is shopping, I think he’ll also be looking for control, for at least one more season. They need another starter next year, although they’ve already got Fedde in the wings. They need to replace Werth next year, but they’ve got the Taylor/Goodwin platoon that looks more viable than it once did.

So we’ll see. For now, all the to-the-Nats rumors seem to be fizzling quickly.

I don’t mind adding a “veteran bench bat” in Kendrick, but Mills seems like a very high price for two months of a reserve. Mills has had a performance this season that probably puts him in the lower reaches of the top 10 of the Nats’ system. I’ve never seen a scouting report on him, though, so I don’t know how hard he throws, and he had struggled up until this year. MLB.com was unconvinced and had him at only #18 in its latest ranking.

So the Nats have moved two good young lefties in two weeks. They seem to be putting a lot of stock in the ones they just drafted, beyond just Romero (who has still yet to pitch).

Werth, Taylor, Heisey and Rayburn – all injured and Kendrick is probably a better hitter at full health than all but maybe Werth (even that may be a push), so I understand that part. And KW is probably right that it’s indicative of a Werth concern. But Mills? Seems like a big overpay. Seems like they should have been able to get a decent bench bat for something much less, like what they gave up for Romero. I’m not a fan of this trade, although Rizzo is smart and I assume that this was the best he could do. I just don’t see the need for this piece. Ok, after all that, on the plus side, I’ve always really liked Kendrick’s bat (although he isn’t the hitter he was).

I also don’t think they are favoring the 2017 draftees – they can’t trade them, even as a PTBNL, so they really have no choice. I think it’s more a measure of the depletion of the talent in the system that only the recent draftees have buzz or value. I don’t mind trading a low A arm, almost ever, because they are lottery tickets. But they’ve now traded 5 or so in the last year, and likely one or two will pan out (Luzardo, Mills, Avila, Hearn, Dunning). That’s a big hit to the system. Probably more to come. If Rizzo added this bench piece, I think he’s still going to load up. Now I’ve completely flipped from yesterday and think he’s got more coming, and maybe big.

Mets-Ramos: I think they got him because he’s controlled next year, when they want to reload. Seems opportunistic and not a bad deal for them. Wouldn’t be surprised to see them sell the rental guys still.

OK, here’s a big part of the reason for the “overpay”: the Phils are eating all but $187K of Kendrick’s salary. Same story every year: the Nats overpay in deadline trades because the Lerners won’t add salary. There’s no way they would have given up Rivero last year if this scenario hadn’t been the case.